Rivers West (Louis L'Amour's Lost Treasures): A Novel

By Louis L'Amour

His dream was to build magnificent steamboats to ply the rivers of the American frontier. But when Jean Talon began his journey westward, he stumbled upon a deadly conspiracy involving a young woman’s search to find her missing brother, and a ruthless band of renegades. Led by the brazen Baron Torville, this makeshift army of opportunists is plotting a violent takeover of the Louisiana Territory. Jean swears to find a way to stop this daring plan. If he doesn’t, it will not only put an end to all his dreams; it will change the course of history—and destroy the promise of the American frontier.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Release date: Sep 30, 2025
• ISBN: 9780593355589

Book preview

Map: The United States and the Louisiana Purchase, 1821.

Chapter I

A ghost trail, a dark trail, a trail endlessly winding. A dark cavern under enormous trees down which blew a cold wind that skimmed the pools with ice. A corduroy road made from logs laid side by side, logs slippery with mud and slush, with rotting vegetation from the swamp.

Here and there a log had sunk deep, leaving a cleft into which a suddenly plunged foot could mean a broken leg, and on either side the swamp…some said it was bottomless. Horses had sunk out there, never to be seen again, and men, also.

My father’s house lay several days behind me, back of a shoulder of the Quebec shore above the Gulf of St. Lawrence. For days I had been walking southward. An owl glided past with a measured beat of great, slow wings, and out in the swamp some unseen creature moved.

Was that a step behind me?

Astride a gap between logs, I paused to listen, half-turned to look.

Nothing…I must have been mistaken. Yet, I had heard something.

My shoulders ached from the burden of my tools. Soon I would have to purchase a mule, a horse or an ox. For the tools I must have with me. Of what use is a shipwright without tools?

Straining my eyes in the darkness I looked for a place to stop, any place in which to rest, if ever so briefly. And then I saw a wide stump from which a tree had been sawed, a full six feet in diameter…and the tree cut from it lay in the swamp close by, half-sunk.

With my left hand I swung the tools to the stump, keeping the rifle in my right, ready for use. This was a far, wild place. There were few travellers and fewer still were honest men. Young I might be, but not trusting.

For the first time I was leaving home, going south from Canada into the United States. Westward, it was said, they were building, and we are builders, we Talons.

There was a time when at least one of the family had been a pirate, a fierce old man even in his later years, I’d been told. He had sailed the far waters of the Indian Ocean, the Bay of Bengal, and the Red Sea, but mostly off the Coromandel and Malabar coasts of India. He’d done well, too, or so it was said. I’d seen none of the treasure he was said to have brought away. Not a man who worked in timber or stone, but even he had been an artist of sorts, a fine hand at carving and metal work even as a child.

What was that? I half-rose from my seat on the stump, then settled back, holding my rifle in both hands.

It was cold, and growing colder.

Behind me, on the Gaspe, I had left only my father’s cottage and the good will of a few of my neighbors. My father was gone. My mother had died when I was yet a young boy, and I had no sweetheart.

Of course, there had been a girl. We had roamed the fields together as children, danced together, even talked of marriage. That was before a man far wealthier than I had come to see her father. To be wealthier than I was not difficult, for I had only the cottage inherited from my father, along with my trade, and she was ambitious.

The other man was a merchant with many acres, a three-masted schooner trading along the coast, and a store. He was a landed and moneyed man and, as I have said, she was ambitious.

She had come to our meeting place one last time, and immediately I could tell something was different. There was to be no fooling about on this day, for she was very serious. Jean, she pronounced it Zhan as was correct, but with an inflection that was her own, my father wants me to marry Henry Barboure.

It took a moment for me to understand. Barboure was nearly forty, twice as old as I, and a respected, successful man, although I’d heard it said he was close-fisted and a hard one with whom to deal.

You are not going to? I protested.

I must, unless…unless…?

Unless what?

Jean, do you know where the treasure is? I mean all that gold the old man left. He was your great-grandfather, wasn’t he? The pirate?

It was further back than that, I said, and anyway, he left no gold. None that I know of.

She came closer to me. "I know it is a family secret. But Jean…if we had all that gold…well, father would never think of asking me to marry Henry. He always told me that you knew where it was, and you could get it…some of it…whenever you liked."

So that was it. The gold. Of course, I knew the stories, for they had been legend in the Gaspe since the old man’s time. He had been one of the first to settle on what was then a lonely, almost uninhabited coast. He had built a strong stone castle…burned by the British during one of their raids many years after, and attacked many times before that.

The story was that he had hidden a great treasure, that he could dip into it whenever he wished. He had bought property, a good deal of it. And it was true he had sailed to Quebec City or Montreal…even down to Boston or New York to buy whatever he wished. But I knew nothing of any treasure, nothing at all.

My father had shrugged off the stories. Nonsense! he would say. Think nothing of treasure or stories of treasure. You will have in this world only what you earn…and save. Remember that. Do not waste your life in a vain search for a treasure that may not exist.

There is no treasure, I said to her. It is all a silly story.

But he had money! she protested. He was fabulously rich!

And he spent it, I said. If you want me it shall be as I am, a man with a good trade, who can make a good living.

She was scornful. A good living! Do you think that is all I want? Henry can give me everything! A beautiful home, travel, money to spend, beautiful clothes…!

Take him then, I had told her. Take him, and be damned!

Perhaps I spoke too harshly. She left me then, and the next time we met on the street she walked by me as if I had not existed.

My heart, I told myself, was broken. For a week I tried to convince myself of it. I tried to write poetry about it, I told myself my life was ruined and had a great time playing with the drama of it, but not for a minute was I really fooled. Actually, only my vanity had suffered, and that not very much. In fact, I was relieved. Now I was free to go out into the world.

Had not we Talons always done so? Talons, that is, of my blood. Others might have the same name, but we of our family knew from whence it came, and how our pirate ancestor had his hand chopped off by a tyrant, and had fashioned an ingenious metal claw to replace it. From that he had taken the name we bore. Talon.

When I was a boy there was an old man in the village who claimed that, when he was a child, he had known the first Talon. He never mentioned the name without a quick glance over the shoulder. Perhaps our family had taken to the building trades and worked to be known as solid and reliable craftsmen in order to put that reputation behind us. It made for a romantic story but it did not confer trust. Good or bad I had my own name to make.

A splash of water…a stir from the swamp.

The muzzle of my rifle shifted to cover the spot. It was an eerie place this, and I should be on my way.

Suddenly my throat choked with fear. From the dark, oily waters of the swamp, a white hand lifted…lifted, faint, ghost-like…it seemed to beckon.

I was on my feet, thumb on the hammer; ready to rear back and fire.

Then slowly the hand became an arm. It dropped over a log, and then a head lifted from the water, a strained white face, gasping…pleading…reaching out.

I sprang forward and caught at the hand.

It was cold…cold. But it was the hand of no ghost. It was flesh and bone. I hauled upon the arm and a body emerged from the swamp and fell across the half-submerged log. Gently then, I turned him over.

Help, the voice was faint, help me, I—

There was a stab wound in his chest, a deep wound from which blood and water bubbled. The man was dying. Had I anything with which to treat him, his life still could not be saved.

—stabbed me. He knew who I was, he— the voice faded.

Easy, now! I warned. I loosened his collar, then tried to ease his position. I’d no idea what he was talking about, nor what to do. He was badly hurt, but from the appearance of the wound I feared the knife had penetrated a lung.

There was another stab wound in his side, and there might be others in his back. We were in the midst of a swamp, on a makeshift corduroy log road that was almost half under water and there was no dry land anywhere about that I could see. Nor any place to build a fire. To carry the man in this condition was unthinkable.

Sir, I said, there’s not much I can do.

He turned his eyes on me and seemed conscious of me for the first time. I know, he said, his voice suddenly quiet, "and I’d rather you…you didn’t try. I’m…I’m somewhat comfortable.

"Got me in the back. He…he got me three times before I was able to turn around. I don’t believe I…I even scratched…him.

A bad man…stop at nothing…at nothing at all. He caught my hand. I am Captain Rob…Robert Foulsham.

American?

British.

It was damp and gloomy. I was far from where I wished to be, which was an inn, somewhere in the five miles that lay before me. It was already late.

He muttered, talked lucidly, then wandered. I stayed close beside him, wishing there was something I could do. He was far gone, and growing weaker.

Get him! he spoke suddenly, loudly. He is…a traitor. He will destroy…destroy. He is— His voice wandered off and he was silent.

Who was it killed you? I asked. Then, realizing how my words must sound, I said, Who attacked you?

Torville…Baron Richard Torville.

What’s he like? Is he tall? Is he—?

It was no use, for the man had died.

I got slowly to my feet and stood looking down at him. What could I do? What should I do? I had no heart to sink him in the swamp, and there was no way to bury him. Yet to leave him where he lay seemed a shameful thing.

If he had relatives, they—

Relatives! I knelt beside the body and went carefully through his pockets. There were some soaked and stained papers, yet there were others in a sealed leather packet. I went carefully through the pockets, found several gold pieces, and in a belt about the waist, several more.

There was a pistol, useless until dried out and recharged. A small pistol it was, though very admirably made.

The few things I gathered together. When I reached a city I would try to mail them…for among the things there might be the address of his relatives or acquaintances.

He was young…older than I but less than thirty, and quite fit. From his youth I decided the title of captain was rather military than maritime.

I had straightened from my final task when I heard a faint splash…a stir or something, of movement. My rifle came waist high, held easily in my hands.

The sounds came nearer, a step and a swish, a hit and a miss.

Who could be on the road on such a night? Certainly, I had been a fool to attempt to reach my destination before night fell, and the captain here had been, apparently, pursuing someone. Suddenly a figure loomed in the darkness.

Come along, I said, if you’re friendly, come easy with your hands in sight. If you’re not friendly I can split you right up the middle.

Avast there! Avast, lad. I’m coming in peaceful, wishing no harm to any man or beast…least of all, to me.

He was six or seven inches taller than my five feet and ten inches, with shoulders like a yard-arm, and he had a peg-leg. He also wore a black beard and there was a gold ring in at least one ear.

Armed, too. I could see he carried both a rifle and a dirk.

You travel late, I said.

He glanced down at the body. Did you kill him? His eyes gleamed at me.

I did not…did you? For certainly he looked the murderer if ever a man did.

Not I. He peered at the body. Well, well. A fine handsome young chap to die so easily. I’ve killed a few in my time, but not that one. He grinned at me. Anyway, I’ve just come up. You stand over the body and that man is freshly dead. The law will ask questions, so you’d better think of some answers.

There is no law here, I said. This is the forest. Yet it is no way for a man to die.

The big man shrugged. Who is to say where a man should die? He dies when his time comes, no matter where. Then, a might wistfully, he added, Only the body of the man is here. What was inside him is gone. So where he lies does not matter.

He gestured down the way. I am told there’s an inn. Are you for it?

I am.

We started on then, leaving the body where it lay for lack of a better thing to do.

The big man wore an old cocked hat and a cloak that made him look even more huge in the darkness. How far is it, do you suppose? I have come far, and this leg of mine, it does not favor long walks.

Five miles…perhaps less. Sometimes the understanding of miles is not well grasped. Five miles can mean over the hill and around the bend or it can mean all day.

I know. He peered at me. You’ve a load there. Is it tools you carry?

Tools of my trade. I am a shipwright.

In the forest? He stared at me. You are to build ships in the forest?

What my destination was, and why, was none of his business, so I simply said, South of here are many seaports where they build vessels to trade with the Indies or ships for whaling.

You’ve a French sound to your voice.

I am French…in part, but Canadian born, and pleased to be.

We walked on in silence, splashing and slipping, swearing a little and grunting. I am called Jambe-de-Bois, he said suddenly, because of this, he indicated the leg.

It is as good as another, I said, a name is what a man makes of it.

True, lad…true. He glanced at me. And you? You have a name?

Suddenly, I was wary. Who was this man from out of the night, coming upon me standing over a dead man and making little of it? Why this sudden interest in my name? For his tone seemed to have sharpened just a little at the question. Moreover, there was about him something vaguely familiar.

Who does not have a name? I find them of small meaning.

Five feet ten inches, I was, and shorter than him. He looked to be a powerful man, but I yielded him nothing on that score. For I was big-boned and muscled, in part it was inheritance, for mine had been a strong family, and in part it was my trade and the handling of heavy timbers and my tools. I believed myself the equal of any man when it came to sheer strength.

Who was he? And where was he going? I longed to ask but had scarcely the right, having refused to tell my name. The vague familiarity about him worried me. I was far from home, yet this man had a feel of the sea about him and something of our own accent in his

Reviews for Rivers West (Louis L'Amour's Lost Treasures)

[fuzzi_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

We meet the second Talon in this story. Jean Daniel is a shipwright, headed from Quebec for Pittsburgh with plans to build steamboats. He pulls a dying man from the depth of a swamp, and soon finds himself involved in a search for the missing brother of a very pretty and capable young lady.

The farther I read, the more I enjoyed this one, a good yarn.

[jbarringer-2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This book was surprisingly entertaining, a lot like the first part of the Wheel of Time series, minus the magic bits and set in the early days of the United States.

[grheault_2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Absolutely loved it. Modest heroes, spunky ladies, honesty, treachery, and action galore. Plus tidbits of history like anti-Catholic laws in Massachusetts in the 1820's. This seems to be a fictionalized takeoff on the alleged Aaron Burr attempt to seize the Louisiana Purchase and to set up a separate county, foiled by patriotic citizens, noble gentlemen, and sassy ladies. Ended too abruptly, but what a great show!

[gwernin · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Some good bits, but too many expository lumps, and at least two continuity problems. Not one of his best, but good enough for a lazy evening.